doorstep wearing wellington boots, pyjamas and a long, padded coat, "but I had to come round and thank you straight away."
"Thank me for what?" asked Brad.
"For making sure I got my puppet theatre, of course," grinned Sally, "Santa explained all about it in his letter."
"His letter?" repeated Brad, now thoroughly confused.
"Yes, silly. The one he put in my stocking. It said how you helped him find my house and … and how sorry you were for teasing me."
Sally looked a little cross as she remembered the things that Brad had said, but then she brightened as she continued.
"We're all meeting later in the park, to play in the snow. Why don't you come along? Everyone will be there, right after the Queen's Speech."
Then Sally turned on her heel and skipped off through the snow. Brad wasn't so sure about her invitation. He didn't think that the other children would be so glad to see him after all the mean things he'd done, but he had barely got back to the living room when the doorbell rang again. This time it was Mario Smith.
"It's the best Christmas present I've ever had," he said, waving the photo in the air, "Mum's going to frame it for me, together with the letter."
"The letter?" asked Brad, feeling a bit wobbly.
"Yes," said Mario, "the one Santa left explaining about the Pole vs Pole championship and about how you had the idea for the perfect present."
The rest of the day passed in a whirlwind of fun and excitement. There were lots of other visitors for Brad, all wanting to thank him for helping Santa. There was a scrumptious Christmas dinner, after which Brad's parents taught him some of the games that they used to play at Christmas, when they were children. It was so nice being there in the warm living room, surrounded by the beautiful decorations, but Brad was surprised to find that what he was looking forward to most was playing with his classmates. Straight after the Queen's Speech, he grabbed his hat, coat and scarf, and headed to the park, eager to see all his new friends.
At about the same time, Santa was yawning a big yawn, as he led Rudolph back to his stable. Christmas starts at different times in different places, and Hawaii is where it starts latest. So while Brad had been enjoying his Christmas Day, Santa had been finishing his long night's work in Honolulu. Then Rudolph had insisted on going to the beach, so they were even later back than usual.
"I must say, you played your part perfectly," said Santa, as he poured out some oats for the tired reindeer.
Rudolph seemed to squint a little at his master.
"I know it was a lot of time to take for just one boy," said Santa, as if answering a silent question, "but think of all the good he will do, now that he has set his mind to changing his ways."
This time Rudolph put his head on one side and, if he had had one, he would have raised an eyebrow.
"Well I think he'll be good from now on," said Santa to the doubtful deer, "it is difficult to break bad habits, but the boy seemed very determined. I'll bet you a pound of oats that we'll be dropping a present down that chimney next year."
And although Santa won the bet, he still let Rudolf have the oats, because Santa's kind like that.
T H E E N D …
… but keep reading, for a sneak preview of
‘Piglet Gets a New Job’
Piglet Gets a New Job
The piglet did not get paid for her job, which was very unfair considering how dangerous it was. She did get a certain satisfaction from carrying out her duties, but this was not the main reason for her not complaining about the lack of pay. The fact was that she had no idea about money. You might say that a more intelligent piglet would have figured it out by her age. Everyone who came to see the circus paid for their tickets - in silver or copper coins, depending on their own circumstances. For the circus folk also, money, or rather the lack of it, was one of their favourite topics of conversation. Certainly the man who fed the piglet never failed to mention money during his visits to her.
"You'll eat us out of house and home, you will," he said as he poured the slops into the trough, but to the piglet, this sounded no different to 'enjoy your meal' or 'bon appetit'.
Thinking about it afterwards, with the benefit of old age and wisdom, the piglet concluded that she had just not needed to know about money at that stage in her life. She was fed daily. She had clean straw to sleep on. She had plenty of free time to play with the circus children. In return, she allowed herself to be fired from a cannon - three times daily. Until one day.
It was their last show on the last day in a small place that they only visited once every year or two. Up until then everything had gone as normal, and the piglet could not think what she must have done in between the second and third shows in order to have delivered such a dramatically different result. The lively crowd had watched with expectation as the piglet was loaded into the cannon. For some, this was the second or even third time that they had seen the performance, but even so, their attention never wandered. They closely followed each elaborate step in the process of preparing the cannon. The setting of the cannon. The checking of the safety net. The fixing of the fuse. Finally, the operator lit the fuse and ran for safety, tripping over – as he always did – just before he made it to the little sandbag wall he had built in the centre of the ring.
BOOM went the cannon. The audience followed, with their eyes, the curved path that the piglet ought to have taken through the air between the cannon and the net. Right on cue the operator staggered to his feet. His face was blackened with soot, and he wobbled about, knocking on his ears as if to get the ringing out of them. Then he stopped. The audience was laughing, just as they always did, but this time there was something wrong with the laughter. It was too loud and a little more … cruel than usual. He looked at the net and was shocked to find that the piglet was not there. Maybe she missed the net, he thought in panic. Maybe she's hurt. Then he realised that the audience were all looking at the cannon. He turned that way too, slowly, not sure that he wanted to see. There was the piglet, halfway in and halfway out of the cannon. Her front trotters thrashed wildly in the air as she tried to free herself from this embarrassing prison, but it was no good and her squeals of distress could be clearly heard, even above the laughter.
The operator ran to try and help her get out, while the ringmaster rushed forward to distract the crowd.
"Well, ladies and gentlemen, now I think we all understand the meaning of that phrase 'squealing like a stuck pig'."
Everybody laughed, and the ringmaster went on to introduce the next act. Meanwhile the cannon, piglet and all were quietly wheeled out of the tent.
It had taken a while to free the piglet. They had pulled, and she had wriggled. They had poured oil onto her, and she had tried to suck in her tummy. Eventually she had come unstuck with a little 'pop', and everyone had fallen, panting, to the grass. The piglet was unharmed, apart from a red ring around her middle, and even this had gone by the time she woke up the next morning. In fact even the memory of being stuck had started to fade, so it was a bit of a surprise when the ringmaster turned up at her sty. Even without his top hat and red jacket, the ringmaster was a figure to be respected. The piglet could not remember any time when he had come to see her before, and so she was quite terrified – especially as he was accompanied by a crowd of circus folk.
"So, little piglet," he said, looking down at her, "it seems that you are too big to fire from the cannon."
The piglet suddenly felt that the situation had been caused by some willful action on her part and that getting larger was due to more than just the natural process of getting older.
"Well," continued the ringmaster, "we don't have room in this circus for people who can't pull their weight."
He looked at the piglet. The piglet looked blankly back.
"Maybe you can juggle?" suggested the ringmaster.
The piglet shook her head.
"Or walk on two legs?" The ringmaster tried.
Again a shake of the head.
"Is there nothing you can do to earn your keep?"
This time there was no shake of the head. Instead a single, solitary tear rolled down the piglet's cheek and dropped to the straw below.
"She could make us a lovely lot of bacon rashers for our breakfast," called out the clown.
"This piglet has been a member of the circus since she was born," said the ringmaster, "and we all know that the circus is a family."
He looked the clown in the eye as he continued slowly, pausing between each word.
"We … do … not … eat … family!"
"Why don't we sell her then," replied the clown, cheekily.
"I'll sell you, if you're not careful," spat back the ringmaster, the tone of his voice making it clear that there were to be no further suggestions from the clown.
Unfortunately, nobody else could think of anything that the piglet could do in the circus, now that she would no longer fit in the cannon. The ringmaster sighed a big sigh and knelt down in order to speak to the piglet more directly. The other circus folk began to drift away.
"I'm afraid, my friend, that we circus people are not rich," he said, as if he were revealing a great secret to the piglet alone, "In fact, we are so poor that, if we are not all able to work – if one single member of our family were to stop contributing – the whole circus would fall apart."
He paused, to let the piglet imagine how terrible a thing that would be.
"So you see how